I was super-stoked to play matchmaker recently. With food and wine, of course. At Taste Washington (an enormous celebration of all things WA wine held over two days in Seattle) I was part of a panel charged with the task of picking Washington wines to pair with a variety of foods. Naturally, I jumped at the chance to claim a sparkling wine: Treveri Cellars Brut. A Blanc de Blancs (100% Chardonnay), it is extremely refreshing with a touch of that yeasty, toasty, bread dough thing adding a subtle level of intrigue.

My dish of choice for this wine was a macaroni and cheese that had some truffle butter mixed in with the bread crumbs atop the casserole. Not some musky, medicinal “truffle” oil that is so overpowering and (in my opinion) a culinary abomination. The zesty, zippy qualities of the sparkling wine lasered right through the rich mac and cheese, served up with that extra complexity on the finish to compliment the truffle flavor.

Please check out Naomi Bishop’s recap of the entire seminar on Seattle Refined. She does a fantastic job of not only summarizing my wine pairing ethos and example, but the contributions of the other fine folks up on the podium as well.

The takeaway: Sparkling wine is the Swiss Army knife of wines. It is the one (liquid, bubbly) tool that can work with just about anything thrown its way.

BONUS: Four interviews with Washington winemakers and two winery sales managers on Grape Collective.

This purple light was affecting me in some unexplainable way. Not, of course, my judgement of the wines and food pairings.

Brut. Treveri Brut. Best claim check for a coat in the history of Taste Washington!

2 Responses

You were rollin’ gangsta, 007. I hope you kept that coat check ticket. I will say this about truffle-infused goods, we did once add a spoonful of the stuff in the “Blue Box” classic mac n’ cheese and it made it super fancy, and kind of mellowed the fake Cheeto-cheese powder, paving the way for a nice bubbly rose.